Edwin Ramos triple-murder trial nears the end

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Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

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Edwin Ramos, charged with the shooting deaths of a father and his two sons last year, shows in court at the San Francisco Hall of Justice where is was announced that the DA, Kamala Harris, will seek a penalty of life in prison without parole on Thursday Sep. 10, 2009 in San Franicisco, Calif. Harris has always said she wouldn't seek capital punishment. less

Edwin Ramos, charged with the shooting deaths of a father and his two sons last year, shows in court at the San Francisco Hall of Justice where is was announced that the DA, Kamala Harris, will seek a penalty ... more

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

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Edwin Ramos, charged with the shooting deaths of a father and his two sons last year, shows in court at the San Francisco Hall of Justice where is was announced that the DA, Kamala Harris, will seek a penalty of life in prison without parole on Thursday Sep. 10, 2009 in San Franicisco, Calif. Harris has always said she wouldn't seek capital punishment. less

Edwin Ramos, charged with the shooting deaths of a father and his two sons last year, shows in court at the San Francisco Hall of Justice where is was announced that the DA, Kamala Harris, will seek a penalty ... more

Photo: Mike Kepka, The Chronicle

Edwin Ramos triple-murder trial nears the end

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Edwin Ramos may look innocent and even have a charming smile, but he is a self-serving liar and remorseless killer of a father and two sons, a San Francisco prosecutor told jurors Tuesday during closing arguments in the triple-murder trial.

Ramos, 25, is charged with the June 22, 2008, slayings of Anthony Bologna, 48, and his sons Michael, 20, and Matthew, 16. Assistant District Attorney Harry Dorfman described the killings as a meaningless act of retaliation for a gang shooting earlier that day.

"These crimes are senseless murders, nothing else," Dorfman told the San Francisco Superior Court jury, which has been hearing the case for more than three months. "You know these were murders. You don't need a prosecutor, you don't need a police inspector, you don't need a judge to know that.

"In your heart and in your mind you know these victims were murdered that day - the evidence tells the story."

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Dorfman recounted the events of that Sunday afternoon, when the Bologna family - driving home from a barbecue in Fairfield - was confronted in the Excelsior neighborhood by Ramos and another member of the MS-13 street gang.

Ramos was on the hunt for Norteño rivals whom he and other gang members blamed for shooting and wounding a friend earlier that day, Dorfman said.

"He made his choices that day, Edwin Ramos, and there were consequences," the prosecutor said. "He chose to drive to San Francisco, he chose to drive to the Excelsior," the home territory of the rival gang.

"The Excelsior is an MS-13 hunting ground," Dorfman said.

It was there, he said, that Ramos mistook at least one of the Bologna sons for a rival, rolled down the tinted windows of his Chrysler 300 and opened fire on the family's car. The only survivor, then-18-year-old Andrew Bologna, testified during the trial that Ramos was the shooter.

Dorfman scoffed at Ramos' "non-gang spin" - his testimony that he had left gang life behind at the time of the shooting and had been associating with his former comrades simply to furnish them with cocaine.

Ramos testified that he had driven to San Francisco from his home in El Sobrante that afternoon to pick up a friend and visit the wounded gang member in an Oakland hospital.

He said he had gotten lost in the Excelsior trying to find the freeway. That's when his friend, MS-13 gang leader Wilfredo "Flaco" Reyesruano, saw the Bolognas and fired the fatal shots, Ramos told the jury.

Reyesruano left town after the killings. He has not been charged.

Dorfman called Ramos' testimony "self-serving" and attacked it as riddled with lies in the face of inconvenient facts.

"Does he care what lies he tells? Does he care how many lies he tells? Apparently he doesn't," Dorfman said.

"In the case of the defendant and Andrew Bologna, they both cannot be right," he said. "One of them is very, very wrong."

Bologna, he said, did a "damn good job of describing the details of the man who shot his father and brothers."

Dorfman told the jury not to be deceived by the defendant's demeanor.

"He tried to charm you with his smile, he even tried to earn your sympathy by expressing false remorse," the prosecutor said. "Don't be fooled by this man - it's too serious, what is going on in this trial."

The case could go to the jury as soon as Wednesday, after the defense gives its closing argument.

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